HIS GIRLFRIEND SLEPT SHOTGUN while he drove north on the Five, his kid sister calling out crossword prompts from the back seat, rarely getting a response.

"One who's in a foul mood," she said. "Two words beginning with 'a-t-u,' then blank, blank, blank, blank."

He had no idea. Nor did he care to think of one.

Traffic surged around them. The hordes of holiday travelers had hounded them all the way from Sunset Boulevard, had frayed his patience desperately thin. He shifted in his seat and caught his sister's attention in the rearview mirror. And that was when he saw it. Out of the corner of his eye. There. Beside the road. Dead. Just a steer in the stockyard. On its side. In the mud. Hooves gathered beneath its bloated stomach like a monstrous beetle basking in the mist of a tower-mounted sprinkler.

Ever the diligent driver, he caught only a glimpse of the beast, just a quick snatch of color, black, and shape, cow—gone so quickly that without his sister's confirmation he might have dismissed it to fatigue.

"I guess that old bull heard that tomorrow is Thanksgiving," she said. "He must have fainted from relief."

She offered a hopeful little laugh that died along with the bull's memory as a man in a light-blue minivan cut across their nose and forced them onto the shoulder at just over eighty miles per hour.

"Fuck Thanksgiving," he said as he struggled for control. "Fuck Thanksgiving. Fuck turkey. Fuck mashed potatoes. Fuck Miles Standish and his stupid fucking, three-corner hat. And fuck us all for buying into this bullshit and driving four hundred miles to eat a meal I don't like anyway."

For a moment, this made him feel very much better. Then that moment passed and all that remained was the dead cow he had left behind and the winding asphalt scar stretching ahead to the horizon, bisecting the heart of California, stitching head and ass into an unlikely whole, carrying carload after carload after over-stuffed carload of dislocated pilgrims back to the families they so long since had left behind.


DINNER THE FOLLOWING EVENING was a predictable affair. He ate too much turkey. He drank too much wine. He discussed the recent presidential election with his father, who hounded him for not voting.

"If I cared who won, I would have voted," he said.

"It's your duty to care," his father said.

"Then let me ask you this," he said. "If put to a vote of one, would you rather be boiled alive or burned at the stake?"

"First off, good men haven't died for my right to make that decision. They've died so that I'd never have to. Second, if given the time to research my options, I'd still choose."

"You know Dad, sometimes I think your egotism knows no bounds."

"What do you mean egotism?"

"Wake up, old man. You live in California. You're vote counts for just two things and two things only. One is jack. The other is shit."

"Shouldn't that be jack squat, dear?" his mother said. "We're still at the dinner table, after all."

She offered him more turkey. He poured himself another glass of wine instead.

"That's the problem with your generation," his father said. "You think you're all so goddamned special. You think you're entitled."

"Entitled not to vote? You bet your ass I think I'm entitled not to vote. Good men died to protect that entitlement for me. It's my inalienable right, remember?"

"You're a generation of slackers and dole-liners. No offense, ladies."

At this, his sister sprang from her seat and ran into the next room, returning almost immediately with the crossword puzzle.

"Dole," she said as she scrawled the word onto the page. "Four letters. To give out. Brilliant."

His father dropped a juicy drumstick onto his plate, prodded it with a fork.

"You see this turkey?" he said. "This meal? This house? This family? This is what you think you're entitled to, but you're not. What you are entitled to is just two things and two things only. The first is jack—"

"And the other is squat," his mother interrupted, taking his father's hand into her own and squeezing gently. "Jack squat, remember dear."


WHEN DINNER WAS OVER, his sister washed the dishes. He dried. His mother dragged two heavy boxes in from the garage and decorated the hearth with plastic pine boughs and stockings that bore their names embroidered in elegant golden thread. This year, there was even one for his girlfriend, who now sat on the couch beside his father flipping through an album of his baby pictures.

"I had no idea you were such a fat kid," she said.

"He's never turned down a free meal in his life," his father said.

Later that night, after all had gone to bed, he snuck downstairs for a bite of leftovers, secretly wishing that he could eat all the remaining food and in so doing prevent his father his one true joy in life, leftover turkey sandwiches. But before he got to the fridge, before he could exact this petty revenge, he saw it. There. On the kitchen table. Open to the first page. The corners yellowed and slightly curled at the edges. His baby album.

He stared down at the first photo. His father smiled back up at him. Or, rather, up at a very much younger version of him that was forever held high above a scruffy-haired, pre-bald version of the man who, in that frozen instant, beamed with a pride reserved only for new fathers of firstborn sons.

He took the picture from the album and held it high above his own head, staring up at the fat little boy who, indeed, never had turned down a free meal in his life. And as he did, he found himself wishing that he could remember what it felt like to be held so high by one so large, and as he tried to recall, a vague memory of comfort settled over him.

When he set the picture down, he saw his sister's crossword puzzle beside the photo album. Only one question remained unanswered. From context, the missing word was obvious, but he read the clue anyway: One who is in a fowl mood, e.g. Two words. He glanced at the empty spaces: a-t-u-blank-blank-blank-blank.

He thought of his father as he picked up the pen. Then his mother. Then his girlfriend sleeping all alone in the room that had once been his. And as he filled in the missing letters, he hoped that maybe, just maybe his kid sister had been right about that big old bull after all.


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